Steve Spurrier on Alabama loss to Vanderbilt: 'That was a stunner'

Steve Spurrier called Alabama’s loss to Vanderbilt a “stunner” and he couldn’t take his eyes off the game.

Diego Pavia was the hero for Vandy and the former Florida Gators coach credited the QB for engineering the upset. He reflected on where Pavia was last year and how it led him to Vanderbilt in 2024.

New Mexico State stunned Auburn last year and Pavia led the same charge at his new school to beat Alabama.

“That was a stunner,” Spurrier said on Another Dooley Noted Podcast. “Yeah, I drove in. I come in a little early to beat the crowd to watch the gator game. And so I’m flipping around up there, and I flipped around the Vandy-Alabama game, gee, Vandy is up 23 to 14? So I watched the rest of it all the way through. And then the media boys up in the press box, our game was about to kick off at almost eight o’clock, so all the media guys up there got a chance to watch the end of it. But it’s really interesting … 

“Here’s how it happened. Last year, New Mexico State beat Auburn at Auburn, 31-10, and they went up and down the field, gained about 450 yards, and had a quarterback named Diego Pavia, and they run the pistol offense, and Auburn couldn’t stop them. They were on the field about the whole game, just like they were against Alabama.” 

Steve Spurrier gives all credit to Vanderbilt offense

Spurrier mentioned how the pistol offense run by Vanderbilt was borderline unstoppable, at least on Saturday night.

“So Clark Lea, the Vandy coach, he sees that tape, and he goes out there, and he gets a Pavia to come to Vanderbilt and a couple of his teammates and two or three guys, and he brings his offensive coordinator, a guy named Tim Beck,” Spurrier said. “But Clark Lea did not mention Tim Beck’s name in all his interviews. And I kept telling people, whoever that offensive coordinator is, he’s gonna be a head coach somewhere real soon or something, because the offense that they put on Vanderbilt, 12 of 18 on third down conversions, they had about 42 minutes (of possession). 

“They ran it, they threw it, they mixed it up. They run what they call the pistol offense, and they know how to coach it. Know how to do it. And this guy, you know, he came in this year, and that’s what’s happening. I don’t know if he’ll still be there next year. The pistol offense that they run is really something that people don’t know how to stop.”